UK doctor ‘deliberately killed’ in Syria jail

Abbas Khan, the British doctor who died in a Syrian jail last year, was unlawfully killed, an inquest jury in London has ruled.

Syrian authorities claimed that Khan, who was arrested last year after travelling to Aleppo to treat wounded civilians, killed himself and was found hanging in a prison cell in the capital, Damascus, on December 16.

But the jury at the Royal Courts of Justice ruled that the 32-year-old orthopaedic surgeon had been killed. They delivered the verdict of “unlawful killing” but said the medical cause of the death was “unascertained”.

Britain’s Foreign Office said the case exposed the “brutal nature of the Syrian regime which has killed thousands of innocent civilians”.

“Dr Khan’s imprisonment without consular access was unacceptable,” Foreign Office minister, Tobias Ellwood, said. During the two-week hearing, the jury was told there was no evidence that Khan had gone to Syria to fight.